Show me Heaven
by hellmouth princess
Summary: Roswell xover. What if Liz wasn't shot? Xander changes things in a visit to Roswell. Character Death


Title: Show me Heaven

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters or settings from Buffy or Roswell, in short, I own nothing.

Spoilers: Some minor from the pilot of Roswell, up to the end of Season three in Buffy.

AN: I got this idea while working on another Buffy/Roswell fic that I'm trying to do at the moment. Originally this was a Buffy fic set when she'd run away after season two but it really wasn't working out so I changed it to a Xander fic. This is set after season 3 when he's on his cross country tour.

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He was going to see all fifty states if it killed him. That's what Xander Harris had decided the day he drove out of Sunnydale in a battered up car that had done surprisingly well. Of course 'well' for this car didn't mean it was going fast, or looked cool at all, it just meant the engine hadn't fallen out yet, because that had been a worry before he left.

He had wondered why Willow hadn't mentioned anything about Hawaii to him. That would definitely be a problem when it came to that state, but he would cross that bridge when he came to it. It might be a while though because so far he had visited two. California and Arizona, but he wasn't far from New Mexico, which would bring the grand total up to three. When he did reach New Mexico the suppressed Comic book geek and sci-fi nerd took over and he couldn't resist a quick visit to Roswell.

The heat was consuming there, worse than the warm California sun it just seemed to beat down endlessly. Xander was glad of the air conditioning in the small UFO museum. Sadly the museum was a bit of a let down, there were more gaudy displays of plastic aliens being dissected and random photographs than solid facts. His stomach led him out before too long and he headed across the street.

The Crashdown café confirmed his suspicions that the whole town was more of a tourist trap than anything else, but when his stomach spoke he listened, so he sat down to a Will Smith burger and a Green Martian Shake. While he was eating he got out the postcards he had bought across the road and started writing them out to the guys back home.

When he had finished writing he put the card down and looked around the room. The walls were painted with pictures of aliens and the waitresses were wearing green dresses with silver alien aprons and antennae, when these people picked a theme they really went all out. The actual people looked quite normal, a few High School kids a handful of adults and yeah there was a couple of freaky looking tourists, but other than that nothing out of the ordinary. It seemed pretty boring actually, the type of place where nothing happened, and after all those years on a hellmouth, he kinda like it.

Xander snorted as he noticed the waitress who had leant him a pen earlier hand a picture of an alien to the freaky looking tourist couple. She caught his eye and smirked before whispering something conspiratorial to the couple before walking away.

Then things stopped being boring. Two men who had already been arguing in a corner started shouting at one another, then one drew a gun. The gun was fired. Xander knew enough about guns from being army boy for one night to judge it all. He didn't even think about himself as he jumped up and knocked down the waitress standing just behind his booth.

He lay down on the floor beside her gasping for breath.

"Thank you" she whispered as she started to sit up, then she gasped as she caught sight of the red patch on Xander's shirt.

"Anytime" replied Xander in a pained voice.

"Someone call 911" shouted a voice from somewhere above him, Xander wasn't quite sure why. His world was starting to narrow down and he could feel oblivion threatening to take over.

"Stay with me" said the dark haired waitress as if reading his thoughts. She was kneeling next to him and holding onto his hand. "Come on, concentrate on me"

"It's kinda ironic" he muttered to himself

"What is?" asked the waitress, she was pretty sure she should keep him awake so she was trying to keep him talking.

"I've fought vampires and demons and a mayor turned into a giant snake and I kinda figured I'd go out fighting the supernatural, and now I'm gonna die by a stray bullet in a diner in the middle of nowhere"

She didn't understand this statement but it was only really the last bit she cared about. "Come on, don't be silly" she said. "You're not gonna die, an ambulance is coming, you're gonna be Ok"

Xander couldn't help but notice how desperate she sounded, and when he looked closely he could see tears in her eyes. "Why are you crying for me?" he asked. "We've never even met; I don't even know your name"

"I'm crying because you saved me. I don't want you to die because you saved me, my life isn't worth yours, you're a good person, and you shouldn't die because of that"

"So what's your name?" he asked

"Liz" she replied, "Liz Parker"

"Well Liz Parker" he said as he felt death getting even nearer. "Your life was worth it". He was so close to death, he could feel it. There were so many things he had still wanted to do, visit the other forty seven states being one of them He tried to think up some great last words, something funny and witty that everybody would remember forever, but in the end all he said was, "I'm Xander"

He looked into the face of the crying girl and couldn't help but smile. He felt happy just being Xander, because at last he was sure that was a good thing. The girl wasn't happy, but she was alive, and that was thanks to him and him alone.

Of course he may not have been so happy if he had truly realised what he'd done. Had Liz Parker died that day it wouldn't have been for long, she would have come back, and when she did she would have opened her life to a whole new world. As it was her life had less heartache, less stress, but at the same time she never got to experience that amazing all consuming love, and she never found out just what was up in all those stars she loved to look at.

But he didn't know that. So Xander Lavelle Harris died with a smile on his face.

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So what do you think? I just figured this worked better than my original version where Buffy ends up driving off a little bit pissed off with a bullet in her arm.

Well nothing left to say now except, please review


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